a Life's Gamble
by THE BOWING DONUTS
Summary: Here is the first rule of gambling: sometimes, you have to settle for less to gain more. Hakuba, Aoko and Kaito by proxy.


**Ly-chan here. Jun-chan has informed me that we're going to die for this.**

**...WE'LL DIE HAPPY.**

**(BTW, there's a lot of mix-up in the tenses in here. Let's hope we can ignore them. |D)**

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**_JUN-CHAN HERE._**

_This was fun to write._

_I'm going to write an actual SMUT version and put it in Facets and Fables... Or Azure Gems. WATCH OUT FOR EET. 8D_

_ANYWAYS. PLEASE REVIEW. I UNDERSTAND THE SUBJECT MATTER IS SORT OF... AGAINST KA FAN CODES. BUT. WE'D STILL LOVE REVIEWS BECAUSE WE LOVE YOU SO!_

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_Here's the first rules in gambling: sometimes, you have to settle less to gain more._

It was a very long corridor. And empty.

The last dredges of the bell had rung several minutes ago, a Kaito with an almost desperate look across his face leaving with it. She had thought of chasing after him in some semblance of worry, but then considered better of it. _Tired of not knowing, of looking at a boy-man she couldn't figure out anymore._

She hardly noticed, thus, of the young blond man who stared at her with a scrutinizing, thoughtful looks. Instead she put her focus on packing her book bag—the muscles of her arms suddenly weak with something she could not put a name to—her pencil, a binder, her maths book; she let her fingers brush against the pocket where Kaito's eraser, given to her many tests ago, laid. She drew a shuddering breath and let her arm fall heavily to her side, fingers curled.

Pencil. Binder. Book. Repeat. _Ignore the eraser and all the things it meant and could mean and won't mean---_

"Aoko-san?"

An absent-minded 'Hn?' towards the voice, barely registering it and whatever significance it had. Her mind was on a certain black-haired, indigo-eyed boy and who he was now. Namely, a baka she could _tell_ was wearing a face that was _fake _towards her (but she wouldn't let herself know how much that hurt; that was past, past). And everyday there were stranger and stranger mysteries surrounding him: the circles under his eyes, the dull gleam in his smile, and _where had he been off to now_?

"Aoko-san, you must be wondering about Kuroba."

She whirled around, finally realizing the voice and its source. Hakuba Saguru stood in the doorway, leaning slightly with a contemplating expression on his face. (She realized something there:

_Neither Kaito's nor Hakuba's faces could she read_.)

The afternoon light trickled across the sides of his figure, sending shadows into the folds of his sweater and in the crannies and smooth features of his face. In the end, the result was an odd sort of chiaroscuro, making Aoko wonder wildly for a moment if he was really there or not.

_Of course he is, idiot._ As real as how Kaito's laugh was often not.

"I...just don't know where he's off to," she replied warily, earnestly. She realized, suddenly, that she should have asked what he was doing staying after, but couldn't do so now---it would be an awkward injection into the fledgling conversation.

"Are you sure?" He pushed himself from the doorway, letting the shadows slide across him erratically. Aoko watched. "I thought it was pretty obvious. There's a heist tonight---and he's abandoning you for it. Again." She thought she could hear sympathy in his voice.

"There_ is _a reason, though. We can't completely blame him...after all, he is the inexorable Kaitou KID."

For some reason, as he walked closer to her and her backpack, she couldn't think about how deluded he was in his accusations like usual, like the rest of the classroom.

There was something---she _mused, pretended, wished_---right about it. Golden eyes glittered, and the sun slanted again.

"Don't you agree, Aoko-san?"

"Oh." She blinked mutely at him. "Yes. Of course."

A smug smile snaked its way to his lips, and he moved closer.

"I thought so." Hakuba stood by the backpack. "There's a nice little Italian restaurant just down the street, and if you have some time, Ao--"

_Hakuba stood by the backpack. _The backpack, with the eraser in it.

"Wait---no. What are we talking about here?" A deer bucks, backs away from the lion. "Saguru-san, not everyone follows your reasonings---"

"You just did," he cut in softly.

"Yes, I know, and I don't know what happened there. Must have been the sun. I was packing up. I'm going home. I---"

"You don't have to; not right now." Another gentle interruption. The windows down the corridor were open.

"Kaa-san will be waiting, you understand. Do you make it a habit of staying after school hours alone?" She didn't know why she was being defensive.

The boy in front of her closed in their space, had her back against the wall. Looked down at her, with---what? Amusement? What _did _he look with usually, anyway?

And how would she know? He sat behind her in class.

"Do you love Kuroba, Aoko-san?"

Her eyebrows rose. "W-Where's all this coming from?"

"Let's stick with curiosity for now."

She bit her lip. "I have no idea, then."

"And if it was asked from a romantic angle?"

Aoko set her jaw. "If it was from there, my reply would be _yes_."

He frowned, looking---irritated? It was still so hard to read him, even with his face only a foot from hers.

"Tell me _why_, then."

"Because---" She started, and then had to stop, because Aoko realized she actually had no idea after all.

_It was so quiet._

"You see?" Hakuba nodded. "Give me a chance, Nakamouri-chan. You'll see how much better I am--I'll be there when he's not, and he's never here, you know that."

_Nakamouri-chan?_

"He'll shield you with another umbrella on a rainy day; I'll shield you with mine. He'll go to work and cheer for KID during a heist; I'll be right there next to your father, catching the bastard thief. He'll care for you, love you, but never put you first..."

_What was he doing?_

" I'll give you everything you've always wanted: and everything you will ever need."

(_The eraser lay forgotten._)

"Just give me a chance."

She stood frozen in her spot--there's a leaf outside, she could see it from the the corner of her eyes, swirling down from it's pedestal at the top of the tree, needed no longer and dying for such--in moment, Hakuba's face is centimetres from her and she thinks here, there's another similarity--

--she never did know when Kaito was moving either, he just did. Slick and smooth, like a spy from those cheesy 1990s movies with a male lead who conquered villains and women like predator and prey.

She hardly needs to guess which one was she.

She wondered here, then, who was the villain, and who was the man?

"S-Saguru-san." She stammered, with what she hoped was a scandalized expression--"Please, I have to get home. I can't possibly--it's not, I mean--"

He ignored her, having backed her up against the wall; his voice a deep, seductive, baritone, silkily whispering; "See? I'm clearly the better choice here...

"Do you have time tonight?" He asked again. There's confidence in his voice that's supposed to be irritating, but was not.

_No_. She wanted to hiss. _No, I'm busy. _But what could she say? Her father was out, because of KID. Keiko was out, because of KID. Kaito was out, because... Because...

Because he was KID.

The finality of that thought shocked her (---along with the fact that she seemed truly, apparently _believe _the fact). It was a punch to the gut, really. _Kuroba Kaito is Kaitou KID, and_

_there. Is. Nothing. You. Can. Do. About. It._

He noticed her distress immediately, just like Kaito does. Except in this case, Kaito was off distressing her, and Hakuba Saguru was here comforting her.

_"I__ am the obvious better choice." _He says.

She knows that he is.

_The sun slants across his hair and eyes and smirk, it catches the gold of his person and turns him into a glimmering, story book character, her prince on a white steed. The kiss, consequently, tastes completely different, warm and dark and like melting chocolate, utterly pleasant and comfortably warm, passionate just enough that she is---_

_---clutching to his clothing, allowing him to tip her head back and---_

_---_"Aoko."

She's returning his kiss in a way that shouldn't be pleasurable for him at all, because she's terribly inexperienced and has no idea what to do but.

"_Aoko._" He gasps this, whether because he was inexperienced too and was just showing off, or she was really _that good. _Kaito wouldn't have gasped then, she knew. And here is where Kuroba Kaito (_one-four-one-two, one-four-one-two, one-four-one-two, it chants like a nursery rhyme, a bloody nursery rhyme, and who gets killed here, who's the star?_) and Hakuba Saguru differs.

She finds comfort in that. Because, for once, she thinks she completely understands him. And somehow, that translates into knowing Kaito as well, and there is elation in her heart.

---_They do something in that gold gilded room that is unquestionably the biggest mistake she will ever make._

The window down the hall is open. A leaf; blown off it's jewel-red pedestal; blows in.

It is a very long corridor. And empty.

The last dredges of the bell had rung several minutes ago, a Kaito with an almost desperate look across his face leaving with it. She had thought of chasing after him in some semblance of worry, but then considered better of it.

She worries about the little things that night. He walks her home like they have something and he doesn't flip her skirt. He drops her off and asks her out for dinner. She hesitates then says yes.

Kaa-san is worried, like always. Aoko says she's fine.

When Kaito calls, their conversation is hilariously short.

"Hi."

"Hey, Kaito---" She pays attention to her maths homework with her pencil and binder and a soft white eraser that does not come from her book bag.

"Free tonight?"

"... No."

"O-Oh. That's fine. I guess."

She hangs up the phone because

_she is tired of not knowing, of looking at a boy-man she couldn't figure out anymore._

Sometimes you have to settle less to gain more.

Here's a second rule: _follow the first._

_... She settles for gold instead of sapphires, and that is just fine._


End file.
